Hi, y’all!
Last week, the Trump administration warned all 50 states that they could be criminally charged if they knowingly leave noncitizen voters on the voter rolls.
Texas Secretary of State Jane Nelson responded to the U.S. Department of Justice on Tuesday. In her letter, she said election officials follow state and federal law as they conduct voter registration list maintenance, and referenced the state’s use of the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements, or SAVE, program to flag potential noncitizens. Nelson added that her office has also referred instances of potential noncitizen voting to the Texas Attorney General’s Office for investigation. You read the full letter here.
In other news, this week I learned that Nelson wrote to federal immigration officials in April to raise concerns about that same federal program. Nelson sent that letter months after the state used SAVE to flag more than 2,000 potential noncitizens on the rolls. Election officials found that some of those flagged voters were U.S. citizens and others may have already provided proof of citizenship when they obtained a driver’s license or state ID at the Texas Department of Public Safety. You can read more about that in my latest story here.
A federal judge last month blocked states’ use of SAVE, but whether states can continue to use it remains in limbo due to ongoing legal proceedings. As of now, Texas and other states that previously used the program are not prevented from investigating the status of any potential noncitizens it flagged on the voter roll.
Nelson resigned from her role last month. Her last day is tomorrow and Gov. Greg Abbott has yet to appoint a new secretary of state. I’m staying on top of all of this and will bring you the latest as soon as we get it.
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The Big Story
Texas secretary of state raised concerns about the federal tool used to flag potential noncitizen voters
Secretary of State Jane Nelson’s office used the federal SAVE data tool to identify more than 2,000 potential noncitizen voters. New records show she questioned its accuracy in a letter to federal immigration officials.
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Judge Sparkle Sooknanan’s ruling on states’ use of revamped federal SAVE immigration database to hunt for noncitizen voters won’t help people already investigated using the system.
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